World Water Day: water for cities |21 March 2011
For this year’s World Water Day, celebrated tomorrow, Seychelles joins international organisations such as the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the United Nations Development Programme and Mangroves for the Future in highlighting the 2011 theme: Water for Cities: responding to the urban challenge.
Local bodies taking part will include the Department of Environment, the Public Utilities Corporation and the Wildlife Clubs of Seychelles.
Protecting and conserving healthy watersheds and wetlands is essential in saving billions of dollars and providing reliable fresh water for drinking and other uses.
Clean rivers in communities and cascading from our hilltops will continue to supply a constant flow of fresh water to the population.
Well-maintained forests in our national parks generate water benefits and supply most of the population with fresh drinking water. Healthy wetlands provide services such as being natural water purifiers.
“Many of the world’s big cities have understood that protecting natural ecosystems to secure their water supplies makes economic sense,” said Julia Marton-Lefèvre, the IUCN’s director-general.
“Rather than chopping down forests or draining marshlands, keeping water catchments healthy saves billions of dollars by not having to pay for costly infrastructure to store water, clean it or bring it from elsewhere.”
We need to protect water resources as towns and cities are often dependent on surrounding rivers, upstream wetlands and groundwater aquifers. These forms of natural water infrastructure, together with engineered infrastructure, pumping and piping systems, help guarantee water supplies to urban areas as cities grow.
Yet many cities are losing precious water resources through leakage or pollution.
Increased demand on water resources, mainly through the many development projects in or near Victoria, are contributing to the great pressure on our water supply for homes and other services.
There is also growing evidence that water resources are significantly affected by climate change, particularly through the impact of floods and droughts.
So the whole population needs to reconsider the value we attach to this precious resource as without water nothing lives, nothing grows – not even people.
Water is the liquid of life, homes for thousands of animals and plants, and it helps regulate the climate. Do not take for granted what is essential for our health and wellbeing, and refrain from tampering with nature’s work so it may serve us well, both now and in the future.
Contributed by MFF Seychelles